The present invention relates to a process for the production of porous products made from boron or boron compounds and particularly to high purity products enriched with boron 10.
For certain nuclear applications, it is advantageous to use boron 10-enriched compounds, particularly for bringing about the absorption of slow neutrons. However, the presently known methods for the production of boron 10, in most cases, lead to boron containing a certain number of impurities, including oxygen and carbon.
In the same way, the known boron production processes, such as the reduction of boron oxide B.sub.2 O.sub.3 by magnesium or calcium lead to impure boron. Moreover, during storage in air, the boron reacts with oxygen to give boric anhydride or boric acid as a function of the ambient humidity, so that the boron is contaminated by oxygen. However, for the production of members based on boron or metallic borides by powder metallurgy, it is necessary to have very pure powders of boron or crystalline boride, which also have a given grain size distribution.
The present invention relates to a process for producing porous borons or boron compound products making it possible to obtain high purity, crystalline products, which can be transformed into powders having desired grain sizes for producing members by powder metallurgy.